"Do I amooze you?" Miley Cyrus asks, hamming it up in a thick New York City accent while wearing an eighties snakeskin getup and chunky gold jewelry and chewing a huge wad of bright green gum. We're on the set of TV's Hannah Montana, and Miley, playing a Mafia princess, is trying to bail Lilly (comic foil Emily Osment) out from yet another dire situation. "You should have a little thing called a Miley shot," she jokes to the crew, as if she didn't already have their undivided attention. "Four cameras on me."

With taping finished for the day, Miley blows back into her dressing room like the teen tornado from Franklin, Tennessee, that she is. "Honey, I think I'm going to wear this tonight," she jokes to her boyfriend, Justin Gaston, referring to her tacky outfit. The model-singer—dressed in a tight black T-shirt, ripped jeans, a Diesel belt, and fairly visible Calvins—has been waiting patiently for his lady for 90 minutes, quietly strumming a guitar. "Good gosh," says Justin, a relatively Zen yin to Miley's easily excitable yang. The actress slips into sweats and promptly announces that she and Justin just looove Disney animation and plan to watch Alice in Wonderland that evening. "It's such a perverted movie," she continues, picking off her fake magenta nails. "It's all about Ecstasy. I swear! Look it up online." Actually, some associate the movie with trippy psychedelics, not Ecstasy, but Miley's claim is just proof of her refreshing naïveté—her biggest vices seem to be caffeine and sushi. And for the record: Miley has never taken Ecstasy. I asked. "Me? No," she answers. But that doesn't mean she's not wild. "I'm a crazy chiquita," she freely admits. "I'm nuts."

Nuts, maybe. But she's also as close to your typical teenager as someone who earned $25 million last year could be. And like most teenagers, she's got strong opinions. Surprisingly strong, considering how the media follows her every word. Take, for example, her current reading list.

The Catcher in the Rye? "A little long." The Outsiders, however, is "the best book ever. He's going to deny it, but Justin," she calls out to her boyfriend, "didn't you cry?" She also loves Netflix, the iTunes free single of the week, and karaoke. But unlike most people, her recent karaoke adventure was with the JoBros. "Joe singing 'Bootylicious' was the most amazing thing I've ever seen," Miley says with no residual animosity in her voice for former flame Nick.

Instead, her knees get knocky over Jude Law, who is "so adorable" in The Holiday, Javier Bardem, who's "so sexy," and Gerard Butler. "You've seen him in P.S. I Love You, right?" Miley asks, swooning. "My favorite. I bawled my eyes out." And don't even get her started on Scarlett Johansson. "She is, honestly, the most beautiful girl I've ever seen. I went to He's Just Not That into You with Justin, and I was covering his eyes." One person who doesn't make her sweat? "I'm not a huge Rob Pattinson fan. Girls aren't really in love with Rob; they're in love with Edward."

Whether Miley herself is in love at this moment is still up in the air.
"I believe in love at first sight," she says. "It just hasn't happened to me." The first time she saw Justin, "I walked right by him. Love doesn't come from attraction, but from somewhere deeper. [Justin] is my best friend." They're inseparable and lately have been writing and producing music together in her home studio.

As for writing with BFFs Demi Lovato, Selena Gomez, or Taylor Swift—"Demi and I are the most alike; I'm anti-drama"—that's not going to happen soon. "I like to keep my friendship separate," Miley says. "Otherwise, competition starts."